"There are two motives for reading a book; one, that you enjoy it; the other, that you can boast about it."
— Bertrand Russell

"Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric."
— Bertrand Russell

"Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness."
— Bertrand Russell

"To fear love is to fear life, and those who fear life are already 3-parts dead."
— Bertrand Russell

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser men so full of doubts."
— Bertrand Russell

"The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time."
— Bertrand Russell

"The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it. "
— Bertrand Russell

"Men are born ignorant, not stupid. They are made stupid by education."
— Bertrand Russell

"Now and then, hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted."
— Bertrand Russell

"War doesn’t decide who is right, war decides who is left."
— Bertrand Russell

"Most people would sooner die than think; in fact, they do so."
— Bertrand Russell

"To teach how to live without certainty, and yet without being paralyzed by hesitation, is perhaps the chief thing that philosophy, in our age, can still do for those who study it."
— Bertrand Russell (A History of Western Philosophy)

"There is much pleasure to be gained from useless knowledge."
— Bertrand Russell

"Three passions, simple but overwhelmingly strong have governed my life: the longing for love, the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of mankind."
— Bertrand Russell

"One should as a rule respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny, and is likely to interfere with happiness in all kinds of ways."
— Bertrand Russell

"This was what Bertrand Russell called his 'Ten Commandments' as a teacher.

1. Do not feel absolutely certain of anything.
2. Do not think it worthwhile to proceed by concealing evidence, for the evidence is sure to come to light.
3. Never try to discourage thinking for you are sure to succeed.
4. When you meet opposition, even if it should come from your husband, wife or children, endeavor to overcome it by argument and not by authority- for victory dependent upon authority is unreal and illusory.
5. Have no respect for the authority of others, for there are contrary authorities to be found.
6. Do not use power to suppress opinion you think pernicious, for if you do the opinions will suppress you.
7. Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.
8. Find more pleasure in intelligent dissent than in passive agreement, for, if you value intelligence, as you should, the former implies a deeper argument than the latter.
9. Be scrupulously truthful, even if the truth is inconvenient, for it is more inconvenient when you try to conceal it.
10. Do not feel envious of the happiness of those who live in a fool's paradise, for only a fool will think that it is happiness."
— Bertrand Russell

"We know very little, and yet it is astonishing that we know so much, and still more astonishing that so little knowledge can give us so much power."
— Bertrand Russell

"Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom."
— Bertrand Russell

"Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own. "
— Bertrand Russell (What I Believe)

"Everything is vague to a degree you do not realize till you have tried to make it precise."
— Bertrand Russell

"It's easy to fall in love. The hard part is finding someone to catch you."
— Bertrand Russell

"One of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one’s work is terribly important."
— Bertrand Russell

"And if there were a God, I think it very unlikely that He would have such an uneasy vanity as to be offended by those who doubt His existence"
— Bertrand Russell

"Really high-minded people are indifferent to happiness, especially other people's."
— Bertrand Russell (The Impact of Science on Society)

"So far as I can remember there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence."
— Bertrand Russell

"I believe that when I die I shall rot, and nothing of my ego will survive. I am not young and I love life. But I should scorn to shiver with terror at the thought of annihilation. Happiness is nonetheless true happiness because it must come to an end, nor do thought and love lose their value because they are not everlasting. Many a man has borne himself proudly on the scaffold; surely the same pride should teach us to think truly about man's place in the world. Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cosy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigour, and the great spaces have a splendour of their own."
— Bertrand Russell

"I would never die for my beliefs because I might be wrong. "
— Bertrand Russell

"As a philosopher, if I were speaking to a purely philosophic audience I should say that I ought to describe myself as an Agnostic, because I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one can prove that there is not a God. On the other hand, if I am to convey the right impression to the ordinary man in the street I think that I ought to say that I am an Atheist, because, when I say that I cannot prove that there is not a God, I ought to add equally that I cannot prove that there are not the Homeric gods."
— Bertrand Russell

"I think we ought always to entertain our opinions with some measure of doubt. I shouldn't wish people dogmatically to believe any philosophy, not even mine. "
— Bertrand Russell

"Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones."
— Bertrand Russell (Unpopular Essays)

"The fundamental cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt."
— Bertrand Russell

"Our great democracies still tend to think that a stupid man is more likely to be honest than a clever man.
"
— Bertrand Russell

"An idealist is one who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it makes a better soup."
— Bertrand Russell

"It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this."
— Bertrand Russell

"Almost everything that distinguishes the modern world from earlier centuries is attibutable to science, which achieved its most spectacular triumphs in the seventeenth century."
— Bertrand Russell (A History of Western Philosophy)

"There is something feeble and a little contemptible about a man who cannot face the perils of life without the help of comfortable myths. Almost inevitably some part of him is aware that they are myths and that he believes them only because they are comforting. But he dare not face this thought! Moreover, since he is aware, however dimly, that his opinions are not rational, he becomes furious when they are disputed."
— Bertrand Russell (Human Society in Ethics and Politics)

"Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth -- more than ruin -- more even than death.... Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit. Thought looks into the pit of hell and is not afraid. Thought is great and swift and free, the light of the world, and the chief glory of man."
— Bertrand Russell

"The greatest challenge to any thinker is stating the problem in a way that will allow a solution."
— Bertrand Russell

"It is the preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else that prevents us from living freely and nobly."
— Bertrand Russell

"The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy - I mean that if you are happy you will be good."
— Bertrand Russell

"The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists — that is why they invented hell."
— Bertrand Russell

"I must, before I die, find some way to say the essential thing that is in me, that I have never said yet -- a thing that is not love or hate or pity or scorn, but the very breath of life, fierce and coming from far away, bringing into human life the vastness and the fearful passionless force of non-human things."
— Bertrand Russell

"No one gossips about other people’s secret virtues."
— Bertrand Russell

"If there were in the world today any large number of people who desired their own happiness more than they desired the unhappiness of others, we could have paradise in a few years."
— Bertrand Russell

"In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted."
— Bertrand Russell

"Not to be absolutely certain is, I think, one of the essential things in rationality."
— Bertrand Russell

"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
— Bertrand Russell

"A sense of duty is useful in work but offensive in personal relations. People wish to be liked, not to be endured with patient resignation."
— Bertrand Russell

"I think that there is far too much work done in the world, that immense harm is caused by the belief that work is virtuous, and that what needs to be preached in modern industrial countries is quite different from what always has been preached."
— Bertrand Russell

"If throughout your life you abstain from murder, theft, fornication, perjury, blasphemy, and disrespect toward your parents, church, and your king, you are conventionally held to deserve moral admiration even if you have never done a single kind, generous or useful action. This very inadequate notion of virtue is an outcome of taboo morality, and has done untold harm.
Bertrand Russell"
— Bertrand Russell